PREVIEW & CHART: The Multiplatform Podcasting / Podcatching Bible

It was a long time ago that Smartphone & Pocket PC Mag discussed Doppler on desktop. Neither are other articles (like Podcasts on a PDA...) up-to-date either, let alone covering all the current podcasting / podcatching solutions for all the three mobile operating systems I (currently – don’t forget I’ll also support iPhone when I get it!) support: that is, Windows Mobile, Blackberry and Symbian S60.

If you don’t know what podcasting and podcatching are about, please do read (at least) the two articles above. After that, you won’t have problems comprehending the chart either.

The chart is here. As usual, feedback is welcome before the final version of this bible is published (which will take at least some days because I’m travelling and the smallish keyboard of my TC1100 tablet isn’t the best for quick touch typing). Note that it has info on all the three operating systems. Yes, even the BlackBerry. Contrary to the popular belief, I’ve found AudioBay pretty much usable (at least here in Europe) for podcatching. Also note that the chart, as usual, is heavily packed with screenshots helping you to find a specific function or just giving you a picture of how a given app looks like. That is, feel free to click the links.

Note that I’ve disqualified the following applications:

Viigo 3.0.18 (Windows Mobile) / 2.2.82 (BlackBerry): very simple in WM and still doesn’t have any podcatching in BB; in Settings, you can only set the max. number of non-enclosure articles and the frequency of autoupdates – nothing else. It only uses its built-in player, incapable of playing anything delicate (videos; AAC on PPC’s – not tested on PPC PE’s in this respect! – etc.) No local OPML import (only via URL), no multiple downloads; downloading is VERY slow. NO auto enclosure refresh!! All enclosures must be manually downloaded. Plus: extensive built-in library.

NewsGator Go! for Mobiles: no direct support for podcatching; only indirect, manual download is supported.

SmartFeed, an old, still widely known, popular app, has been incorporated into NewsGator in the meantime.

The Windows Mobile version of the otherwise very nice and famous Doppler is plain useless and far inferior to any of the products in the chart.

Other, known titles like Spb Insight (as of the current, 1.5.1 version) aren’t enclosure-capable at all.

I've just been told the Blackberry version 4 of AudioBay will be available in October/November and have the same features as the WM version 4, with possibly the exception of no streaming. This is GREAT news, given that it's still not known when the BB version of Viigo does receive podcast support. And, of course, the podcasting capabilities of the current WM version of Viigo are far inferior to AudioBay 4 - that is, I don't expect the BB version of Viigo, if it at all receives podcasting support, will be better than those of AudioBay.